All brass issue Cap Badges of the Great War - Page 2 - British & Commonwealth Military Badge Forum

Rob Truscott · #16 21-11-15, 11:17 PM

Interesting that the 4th Irish Dragoon Guards dont feature an order for GM type...- something addressed lately with unconvincing frequency on some sales sites !

TRT · #17 22-11-15, 12:19 PM

Not being a subscriber of the journal, could someone kindly list the infantry Regts who had the 1916 all GM badges please.

Thanks

TRT

KLR · #18 22-11-15, 12:59 PM

I'm not going to break any copyright laws but here is the link
http://www.themilitaryhistoricalsociety.co.uk/

KLR · #19 22-11-15, 02:11 PM

A few years ago I told a very small group of friends in confidence what these infantry units were - as I'm sure Andy will acknowledge. I said at the time that it was hoped to publish a detailed article - which has now appeared as

Julian Bowsher and David Linaker …, Cap badges of the First World War
Part 1 –The Regular Forces; The all gilding metal badges, the unpierced badges and strengthened badges with a note on the badges of the war raised units.
Bulletin of the Military Historical Society, volume 66, no.262 (November 2015), 78-88.

I'm sad that David never lived to see this project come to fruition. We never intended to illustrate any of these badges as the article was / is purely a piece of documentary research.

As I have the text of this article on my computer, I guess I can paste here the list of infantry badges with new all GM badges without breaking any law. Though you would have to read the whole article for the full analysis of this data. What we concluded with however, is that this list constitutes the only authorised all GM infantry badges (that were hitherto made in BM) and that any others are "unofficial" (to say the least).

New Previous Amount Unit
Pattern Pattern ordered

6707A/1916 (6707/1907) 20,000 Royal Scots
4681A/1916 (4681/1898) 20,000 Queen’s (Royal West Surrey) Regiment
4554A/1916 (4554/1897) 15,000 Norfolk Regiment
4612B/1916 (4612A/1903) 20,000 Devonshire Regiment
4565B/1916 (4565A/1901) 15,000 Suffolk Regiment
4620A/1916 (4620/1898) 13,000 East Yorkshire Regiment
4521A/1916 (4521/1897) 15,000 Bedfordshire Regiment
4522A/1916 (4522/1897) 12,000 Leicestershire Regiment
4564A/1916 (4564/1897) 22,000 Cheshire Regiment
4643A/1916 (4643/1898) 27,000 Royal Welsh Fusiliers
4452A/1916 (4452/1896) 15,000 South Wales Borderers
4684A/1916 (4684/1898) 10,000 Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers
4557B/1916 (4557A/1901) 7,000 East Lancashire Regiment
4607B/1916 (4607/1902) 12,000 East Surrey Regiment
4691A/1916 (43691/1898) 15,000 Royal Sussex Regiment
4622A/1916 (4622/1898) 12,000 Hampshire Regiment
4632B/1916 (4632A/1901) 5,000 Dorsetshire Regiment
4581A/1916 (4581/1897) 9,000 South Lancashire Regiment
4636A/1916 (4636/1898) 30,000 Welsh Regiment
4514B/1916 (4514/1901) 8,000 Essex Regiment
4639B/1916 (4639A/1901) 12,000 Northamptonshire Regiment
1890B/1916 (1890A/1899) 17,000 King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry
4451A/1916 (4451/1896) 18,000 Middlesex Regiment
4493A/1916 (4493/1897) 15,000 North Staffordshire Regiment
4492A/1916 (4492/1897) 10,000 Leinster Regiment
4642A/1916 (4642/1898) 12,000 Royal Munster Fusiliers

I'm leaving the matter to rest here and hope it is of some interest to members. I hope to finish off Part 2 in a few months.

John Mulcahy · #20 22-11-15, 07:23 PM

Julian

My copy has not made its way across the Atlantic yet. I look forward to reading it.

I do acknowledge your commentary that it is a piece of documentary research and I understand well what you mean by that.

I have been spending my free time on the Royal Munster Fusiliers over the past year or so, thus I will not be able to add anything on the reasons why the Royal Dublin Fusiliers and The Royal Irish Fusiliers were excluded.

We have both seen the strike through with annotation that these regiments were excluded from the program in the RACD register. I speculate that is must have been a deliberate intervention that did not involve stock in hand or anticipated demand. It is hard to think that they had substantially more stock on hand than other similar sized regiments or that they did not need as much incremental production as say the Leinster Regiment (a smaller regiment, 7 Bns vs. the 11 Bns of the R.D.F. & the 14 Bns of the R. Irish Fus.)

John

badger123 · #21 22-11-15, 08:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by John Mulcahy

Julian

It is hard to think that they had substantially more stock on hand than other similar sized regiments or that they did not need as much incremental production as say the Leinster Regiment (a smaller regiment, 7 Bns vs. the 11 Bns of the R.D.F. & the 14 Bns of the R. Irish Fus.)

John

John, I agree and I think it would also apply to the York and Lancs who raised 22 battalions in ww1.

Ivan

leigh kitchen · #22 01-12-15, 07:41 AM

Sitting checking this forum, TV on in the background, I heard the words "World War 1 belt".
The programme was " Cash In The Attic" and amongst the items being picked over was a WWI era souvenir badge belt (trophy belt, hate belt), and amongst the insignia on it were two Yorkshire Regiment cap badges, one white metal, the other appeared to be yelllow metal.
Could be dirty W/M, could be OSD with the finish wlrn off, but it looked like brass / GM....

MH331 · #23 02-12-15, 11:27 AM

And the Sherwood Foresters who raised 33 battalions in WW1.

Noting the private purchase Notts & Derby GM Gaunt marked badge is not an EI.

Quote:

Originally Posted by badger123

John, I agree and I think it would also apply to the York and Lancs who raised 22 battalions in ww1.

Ivan

Charliedog012012 · #24 02-12-15, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by leigh kitchen

Sitting checking this forum, TV on in the background, I heard the words "World War 1 belt".
The programme was " Cash In The Attic" and amongst the items being picked over was a WWI era souvenir badge belt (trophy belt, hate belt), and amongst the insignia on it were two Yorkshire Regiment cap badges, one white metal, the other appeared to be yelllow metal.
Could be dirty W/M, could be OSD with the finish wlrn off, but it looked like brass / GM....

I picked up what appeared to be a dirty GM badge for the Yorkshire regiment and knowing that their badges are white metal, I queried it on the forum. The 'badge' is actually a collar badge, albeit quite large and this might apply also to the one that you saw.

davidwyke · #25 02-12-15, 01:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by leigh kitchen

Sitting checking this forum, TV on in the background, I heard the words "World War 1 belt".
The programme was " Cash In The Attic" and amongst the items being picked over was a WWI era souvenir badge belt (trophy belt, hate belt), and amongst the insignia on it were two Yorkshire Regiment cap badges, one white metal, the other appeared to be yelllow metal.
Could be dirty W/M, could be OSD with the finish wlrn off, but it looked like brass / GM....

Hi Leigh

I think the answer lies in what is on the reverse, which I realise you don't know if you saw it attached to a belt on TV.

Blades - OSD cap badge with finish worn off.

Lugs - OSD collar badge with finish worn/polished off.

Slider - theatre made cast brass cap badge. Yorkshire Regt did have them and I have one, although they are more likely to date from WW2.

To the best of my knowledge they didn't have the so called WW1 brass economy cap badges.

David

leigh kitchen · #26 02-12-15, 02:18 PM

I'm afraid that's the extent of my research on the subject - daytime TV.
I did see about 20 years ago, a thin, cast yellow metal badge with slider broken off and missing but did'nt buy it.
As usual, I regret the purchases I don't make.

magpie · #27 02-12-15, 02:33 PM

I think there's an or used to be online yorkshire regt museum page of badges used and there's a gm issue badge for ww1 on it.

davidwyke · #28 02-12-15, 03:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by magpie

I think there's an or used to be online yorkshire regt museum page of badges used and there's a gm issue badge for ww1 on it.

Hi

I think the badge at the Regt museum was discussed on the forum previously. On the web site it is/was described as "other ranks service dress cap badge 1914-1918 (emergency issue). I can't remember what the outcome was for sure but I have a feeling it was determined to be a OSD cap or collar badge with the finish gone. Had a quick look using the search facility but couldn't find the relevant thread. Perhaps I'm imagining it!

David

KLR · #29 02-12-15, 08:27 PM

If you look up the article on these things you'll see that the bimetal Notts & Derby badge was not of the construction type that required a new single metal (ie 'all GM' type). The WO was also adamant that WM badges such as for the Yorks Regt would not need to be made in all GM.
What I can tell you though is that in a WO tender of April 1916, 18k bimetal Notts & Derby badges were required and 20k WM Yorks Regt badges were required.